HN has always been inspiring regarding starting your own business and although that is something I want to try, I'm more curious right now about the feasibility of finding a job outside the country. The question is, I don't know if that's even possible.
How would a company even determine if I'm worth hiring and going through all the work to get me a work visa if they can't even interview me in person? Would they tolerate my crappy internet if they try to interview me over Skype? What if the position was for something mid-to-entry level and not some key position. Would it still be worth the hassle to get me on board?
I actually got in touch with German company who had a job posting for JS developer and asked them this very question and their reply was encouraging[0] but I wondered if I could get more input from other sources.
I guess I ask cause I keep hearing complaints about the lack of talent and it makes me wonder if that's a possible opportunity for me.
So what are your thoughts?
[0] Sociomantic Labs response to my question[1] "For our team in Berlin we often hire outside of the EU and have lots of experience with this. We have 35 different nationalities in the office and always welcome a new team member outside of the EU."
And remember to: Hustle hustle hustle. Setup web page alerts (I use Versionista https://versionista.com) for when a job page from a company you're interested in changes or is updated.
And please, I can't say this enough, learn to market yourself and your work!
> How would a company even determine if I'm worth hiring
> and going through all the work to get me a work visa
> if they can't even interview me in person?
A note on in-person interviews:
You will probably be flown to Europe and do the interview in English. Most English speakers in Europe learned it as a second language. If you learned English from a local Somali school, your interviewers will not be used to your accent and may have a hard time understanding you. You should practice your accent until you sound close to British or American.
> Would they tolerate my crappy internet if they try to
> interview me over Skype?
Otherwise, you'll need to find a way to skip the initial phone interview. Most software companies do phone interviews to screen out candidates who are not capable of programming. A good substitute is a portfolio of personal projects on GitHub, showing experience with the programming languages you put on your resume.
> What if the position was for something mid-to-entry
> level and not some key position.
Just to throw a point of reference in there.
That's not at all true... We (Silent Circle) have hired plenty of people without any sort of face-to-face conversations. It's not uncommon for someone to work for us for several months before getting the chance to meet some else in the company face-to-face.
I didn't have any video chat interviews, either, although that's typical practice for us.
I think Skype works well enough on my home connection but I don't do voice chat often. If anyone is willing to give my a mock interview over Skype my email's in my profile.
I presumed you must be a transplant to Somalia after reading your initial post.
I'm also not interested in pursuing further higher education since I graduated university hating programming and now can't imagine myself doing anything else. Don't feel like going through that stuff again (though it'll probably be a lot easier now that I can code).
As long as your foreign degree is evaluated equivalent to a US degree, there is no advantage to having a non-us masters degree for obtaining a H1B visa.
Unless things have changed since I got my H1B in 2012, but I doubt it.
If you want to increase your options: Create a blog and write great programming articles (I would appreciate it), engage in open source projects as a truly code collaborator, etc. Eventually you'll have more options than you initially thought, you're marketing yourself.
Bad internet connection? This might be a killer, for some people voice is fine but if you have a connection that work great when you're in a video call in HD, it's much better. Communication is key, trust me on this one.
Not sure why you believe this. The UK is very unfriendly towards immigrants since the new government formed in 2010 and abolished the tier 1 highly skilled migrant visa.
This means there's no longer a route for highly skilled non-EEA migrants to work for themselves unless they are considerably well off (1m GBP+) and want to play entrepreneur, or they're already the top of their game and qualify for an 'exceptional talent' visa (which is almost nobody).
If you want to work in the UK as a non-EEA person you have to go the tier 2 route and find a sponsor for 5 years. For those 5 years you will NOT be allowed to start your own business on the side. It's debatable if you can even do freelance work on the side. Your sponsor may take advantage of the fact that switching jobs is very difficult and expensive for you.
After 5 years, you can apply for ILR and work for yourself, although there's no guarantee you will get it even if you follow all the rules because the rules can change [1] in those 5 years as the UK grows more anti-immigrant!
I really don't understand what kind of talent they expect to attract -- the idea of having my hands tied behind my back for 5 years at the peak of my life is an absolute deal breaker for me. They might attract very young people, but for highly-skilled people in their late 20s and older the UK is simply not a very appealing option anymore. Furthermore, if you had 1m GBP lying around you'd be better off buying e.g. Maltese citizenship and having access to the whole of the EU instantly.
Australia is one of a handful of countries that still has sensible highly-skilled migrant policies, but anti-immigration sentiment is rising there too.
[1] http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/news/visa-refusal-for-...
1) Their time zone needs to be reasonably in step with mine.
2) Their internet connection must reliably be able to run a consistent voice connection during working hours.
With 2) we do help with UPS' and additional connections where power and outages can be an issue. But _all_ connections still must be able to do voice comms over.
Other than these two, I couldn't care if the other person is on the moon, except the latency...
I can see arguments for both wanting the timezone to be similar, and for caring mostly for availability/output during "core" hours -- but I'd be curious to hear your views and experience?
Blah blah, globalized economy, blah blah. But I would love to hear other Africans from Kenya, SA, and elsewhere chime in and correct my foreigner BS here. My time there was short, so I can be way off base.
So, if someone is interested, and please do not take offense, I am curious: how stable is the net where someone can expect to Skype and chat with you 8-10 hours a day? I am embarassed, but even as an expat living in the MENA region, I might be stereotyping Somalia, but if it is Kenya it is really luck of the 3G draw.
I pay for 512k connection for $40/month and the speed is as advertised mostly since my download clock in around 50kbps mostly. 1mb/2mb/3mb/4mb go for $100/$200/$300/$400 but I don't bother paying for it since I have access to fast internet at the office.
My biggest worry about remote work is that employers would want me online all the time but my internet may go down more often than they'd tolerate (not to mention electricity going down). But for the most part the net and electricity only go down for minutes per day.
The best thing would be to work via email with someone who knows what they want and knows how to describe it well but I don't know if that would be acceptable to most.
Good luck, I do hope people like you make it. It is what makes the internet cool.
Don't take this the wrong way, but you were born in Jeddah so I assume you're muslim. If I were you and considering living in the US, you'll do far better if you stick to the coasts. And probably better on the east coast (nyc, boston), just because there's lots of visible muslims there so people won't be freaked out by you. My country can be very islamophobic (I'm sorry).
Regarding unhappiness at work, I was in your situation some years ago and found that the solution to my problem was putting in the required hours at work and then going home and working really really hard on the things that mattered to me. Also I found that having a daily exercise routine helped a lot with my productivity and mood!
Regarding leaving your country, I'd start by marketing yourself better. Your site doesn't give specifics on what your ambitions are and does not showcase why I'd want to hire you. Perhaps, if you SHOWED me what projects you can do for me, I'd be more inclined to see where you'd fit in my organization. A great example of good marketing was this kid's portfolio that sprung some weeks ago: http://www.hostmeinca.com/
Another way to leave is by getting a masters in another country. Look for masters in a field you're curious about and then search for scholarships. There are tons of scholarship resources out there (google Fullbright, Daad, Gates Millennium Scholarships, UK council scholarships). A masters is also a great way to network and meet potential employers or even future coworkers that might end up giving you a recommendation down the line!
Some other advice (and I know the HN crowd will probably differ): - GET ON LINKEDIN! Get people you've worked with to endorse you! - go read this book by John Somnez called Softskills. It will help you market yourself better as a developer http://simpleprogrammer.com/softskills
Hope this helps!
I haven't put much thought into marketing myself but maybe I should. Just never thought it would be worth it.
That article about free high education in Germany a few weeks ago had me thinking about pursuing a Master's in Germany but I haven't pursued it.
Thanks for the comment. I like each of the points you've raised and if I want a change your advice sounds like a nice start.
For those wondering what Somcable is; they're a company who brought fibre-optic internet to the country. Currently haven't started selling to the general public but certain larger business have access (for an absurd amount of money, think four figures a month for a 2 or 4mbps connection).
US companies prioritize US candidates (even in remote jobs), to an extend that it's almost pointless to apply for US remote jobs if you no live there.
Perhaps that was part of the issue you had while searching.
https://techmeabroad.com/ http://www.jobsintech.io/
If you have the skills and resume, I'm sure you won't have trouble finding a job.
Also https://remoteok.io/ is a great resource for remote jobs. Most employers don't care as long as you can get shit done and work with a team. If you are a professional full stack developer your confidence in your ability to produce will come through.
You will probably have to work more to get to where you want compared to some American counterparts, but the path is there and the tools are out there. Best of luck.
However, at our peak, our dev team had one Canadian born person at any time. My co-workers hailed from China, Iran, and Israel. We tried to hire some people out of the Ukraine, but I live in the Hinterland and -40 degree weather scared at least one...:)
So, yes it is possible. Heck, some provinces will fast track highly skilled workers to permanent resident status. A good friend of mine was a provincial nominee who just became a Canadian citizen a few years ago!!!
Good luck!
All else being equal, most companies would prefer to hire someone from the US or someone who has a green card. But like you said, now many tech companies have trouble to find talented people. The company where I work has an especially hard time find mobile developers (iOS and Android). Those companies would be happy to hire you.
The problem in the US is that is actually very difficult to get a visa. Visa law is very complicated. I would say, read up on different kinds of US visas and see if there is one that could apply to you. There is also the "green card lottery", where a certain number of people each year get an unconditional green card.
This all being said, unless you plan to study in the US I think your changes in the EU would be better.
So no, it won't necessarily cause you problems – you do need to be able to work and deliver on your connection, and you need to actually be good at what you do. That means you need to have a way to show me that you're good at what you do – for example, a well-kept collection of public github repos of modules, or contributions to major projects (and actual contributions, not "small readme changes to clarify example 3") is what I expect to see, and most certainly not a 'portfolio' of ToDo-style projects to demonstrate how you 'know <x> end-to-end' – that shows me nothing. I'd rather see a well-written Angular module than a ToDoMVC app that looks like it's been generated from a 101 tutorial.
Hope that helps, and good luck!
1. You are capable of doing the job and deliver when you promise or communicate when that isn't possible.
2. You have reliable infrastructure to do the job. Whether that is Internet, Phone or other means, you must be reliably reachable and capable of producing and talking daily. Without that it is hard for me to work with you as part of the team.
3. I can pay you and not have any government hassle because frankly I am just not big enough to deal with craziness.
If those things are doable I am generally good. I have friends in India who loose power on a relatively regular basis but I can work with them because they are reliable in their schedule and capabilities. Frankly, I think it is stupid of US companies or any country to think they have a lock on the best and brightest, just because you are from a war torn country doesn't make you less capable or intelligent than anyone else.
Good luck and I wish you the best.
Blogging\twitting is a good way to get yourself out there.
I had two options - blog\answer Qs at SO\tweet\contribute to OS projects or choose entrepreneurship. I choose entrepreneurship because I thought rewards are much higher if things are able to click. Unfortunately, things have not clicked the way I had wanted but I am not giving up. Did I made a wrong decision? May be not.
Now, I am thinking about starting on a slow speed on blogging\tweeting so that I can get myself known.
I know few people who started with blogs and made contacts out of that. It is a good form of networking. These contacts landed them few consulting gigs which slowly turned out to be a multi-million dollar business per month. There is nothing like when things automatically fall into place.
The larger ones will fly candidates in for final stage interviews to meet face to face.
It's a numbers game - apply to enough roles that you would make the move for and you will increase your chances of success.
Bottom line, your location and its limitations would not inherently eliminate you. If we were hiring and wanted to move forward with you as the lead candidate, we'd also need to check with our attorneys for tax and legal consequences of sending payments to Somalia. But presuming those issues could be resolved satisfactorily, you being in Somalia would not be an insuperable obstacle .
Bad Internet connection for the initial pass would not be a problem for us, those who have the necessary background (enough relevant technical expertise and willing to move) get sent a homework with a few day deadline, and those who handle it well will be interviewed.
It is definitely possible to work remotely, you just have to find the right match. In fact, I've been thinking about looking for developers in African countries, because of the small time zone difference.
So, I'd say it's definitely possible, you just need to have the right skills and find the right company.
1) Yes, there are many, many companies who have difficulty finding good talent locally and are forced to look at the international market for talent.
2) Yes, they can get a visa for you if you are good enough (see below)
3) As others have said, remote working from your own country is definitely a possibility. I do it from Japan (and work very strange hours so that I can work with others in the UK). Working remotely is a skill in itself. If you are interested in influencing process (and it seems that you are), then I would recommend staying away from remoting unless the rest of the team is also remote. If you can go with the flow and just write code no matter which way the process goes, then remote development may be for you. The main problem with influencing others remotely is that you don't end up in the right conversations at the right time.
If you try to get someone to sponsor a visa for you, the main issue is: are you good enough? The rules for sponsoring visas depends on the country, but as there is a world wide shortage of good programmers, you are likely to find someone willing to hire you (especially if you aren't picky about where you go). As others have said, English is the language used generally, but if you wrote the above yourself, then I think your English is probably fine.
You should consider whether or not someone hiring you is good enough for you. Although I don't know exactly what is causing your problem in your current job, "I feel like I'm at a dead end because we do thing in a crappy way and nobody will listen to me" is a very common situation in many companies.
Assuming you want to "do thing right" (according to your own definition of "right"), it means you have to be a bit more picky about where you work. Your main hurdle is to show that you have skills that they couldn't find in their home market.
As you mentioned JS, here's the kind of thing that I mean:
Level 1: I can write basic front end code that uses jQuery to get things done. I have written a few functions on my own, but mostly copy and paste things from Stack Overflow.
Level 2: I can write dynamic front end web applications using one or more frameworks. I can use these frameworks fluently, but rarely go outside of them.
Level 3: I write code in JS. If you want, I will use whatever framework you want, but it doesn't really matter to me. I'm familiar with many styles of programming and can use testing frameworks like Jasmine well.
Level 4: I'm an expert in JS. I routinely contribute bug fixes, and features to various libraries. I write blog posts about how to write better JS applications.
Level 5: I am an internationally renown expert in JS. I maintain one of the really popular frameworks, or I have written books that are popular on the topic.
Basically, I can find thousands of JS "programmers" in the Level 1 category. I don't want them, even if they are cheap.
We get hundreds of CVs from local people in the Level 2 category. We might consider a local person for a junior position, but would definitely not go out of our way to bring in someone at that level.
Level 3 starts to become interesting and we would probably interview someone who needs a visa. At this level, though, you have to convince us that you are super talented to make us want to go through the effort and cost of sponsoring you.
At level 4, you are demonstrating that you have rare skills and initiative. Although personally I think it's actually a fairly low bar to hit, the number of people who do this kind of thing is really very small. It's nice because we can evaluate your skills to a certain degree before trying to hire you.
At level 5, it is trivial for us to sponsor a visa. We still might not hire you if we think you aren't actually a good fit for our team, but I pretty much guarantee that we would eagerly interview you.
Of course there are many more things we consider when hiring people, the above is really just the kind of thing we look at with respect to sponsoring a visa. We just can't justify to ourselves or the government that we couldn't find someone locally unless there is something obviously special about you.
Having said that, you may notice that putting yourself in a Level 4 or even Level 5 position is not something that is outside of your control. Working in a "dead end" job while you spend your time making yourself more marketable to a worldwide audience is probably not the worst thing you could do in the world.
I hope this helps :-)